Protestantism Finds a Type in Jezebel

Original Protestantism and modern hard-core Evangelical Protestantism did and do like to point scary and negative imagery of the Apocalypse at the Catholic Church. For example, the beast is the papacy, and the harlot of Babylon is the Catholic Church. In one view, for SDAs, the Catholic Church will impose the mark of the beast on good Christians, and for them, this mark is worshiping on Sunday instead of Saturday. Too, probably some Protestants will say that Jezebel, who is contained in the midst of the seven churches is the harlot of Rome, the “diabolical Catholic Church.” Well, the Catholic Church cannot necessarily reverse this imagery upon the Protestants to get even because the Catholic Church would never say that Protestantism is utterly of the devil, since it has a great amount of goodness. Heck, Protestantism is still Christianity, even if in heresy, and that is not apostasy, as with, say, atheism or relativism, which are utterly diabolical. Indeed, Protestants have almost all of Scripture and two wonderful Sacraments, at least usually, Baptism and Marriage, in validity. That is a lot of goodness. The CCC speaks favorably of our separated brethren and calls for loving dialogue and pursuit of reunion. So in no wise can some dumb Catholic call Luther the Beast, or Calvin the False Prophet, or Protestantism in general the harlot. OK, good. But what about Jezebel? Yes, yes, I know that seems inconsistent, or that we will be being judgmental or condemnatory. Just bear me out. No, we will be condemnatory but suggesting theology about Protestantism that is very correlated to Catholic mystical concepts. Indeed, before more ecumenical times of today, many saints who lived during or after the associated, insanely explosive heretical rebellion spoke or wrote viciously scathing language towards “heretics,” knowing that their hyperbolic scolding of the Christians most separated from us was truly out of love, if even tough love, rather than any sort of malice or ill-will.

Toward this end, we remember that hyperbolic language is no stranger to Scripture, or even to the words of Jesus himself. Indeed, many sayings of Jesus, whether directly or in parables, could lead us to believe we must cower before Jesus as a dreadful judge who is ever waiting to condemn us to the fires of hell. Luckily, we have the Church to give us an understanding of Scripture, so that when these verses are presented to us, we do not need to react in extraordinary anxiety but understand that they are, again, “hyperbolic,” intended to, with exaggerated demeanor, exhort us on to an urgent task and end, the negation of which could mean serious consequences, but not in the sense that we abrogate the nature of Our Lord as a loving and kind Savior who is ever here to pick us up in our weaknesses and give us the help, in love, to pursue the goal of eternal life.

So, it shouldn’t surprise us that if we take on what is clearly the allegorical Scripture of allegorical Scriptures, the Apocalypse, we should should except an abundance of hyperbole. In fact, the letter to the seven churches is saturated with such exaggeration. This brings us back to the task at hand, Jezebel. Here, scathing words like fornication, meat sacrificed to idols, infidelity, and even the exclamation of children being killed with death are thrust upon us. If taken literally, it could never refer to Protestantism. Too, a whole backdrop analysis of the seven churches’ discourse would be needed even to make a reasonable application, seeing as we cannot come out nowhere and just pin something in. That would be raw eisegesis. As it stands, I humbly attempted to provide a comprehensive view of the seven letters a while back, the larger context of which can be referenced here to apply Protestantism to Jezebel, and this is that parent essay:

The Seven Apocalypse Letters Revisited: a Renewed View of the Ages of the Church

From there, if one wishes to visit it, the again backdrop theology for the delineation of the letters in general can establish a more likely correlation of Jezebel with Protestantism, which occurs, for the record, in letter four, Thyatira. Toward these ends, we will see that when we interpret the harsh hyperbole toward Jezebel and her victims as ecclesiological realities, rather than literal heathenism, profound characterizations of the serious consequences of the Protestant Rebellion in history emerge. From here, we commence the argument by siphoning out the primary content from the above parent document.

Two Weird Things

To begin, we need to look into a few aspects of the letters. More to the point, there are two bizarre concepts in the seven churches’ letter that stand out. They are:

Fornication
Idol worship

Fornication as Invalid Holy Orders in Heresy

The woman at the well showed that human sexuality is intimately tied to holy orders, in the sense that every person ordained to holy orders is a true husband to his community. See here:

The Woman at the Well as Ecclesiological Type: Fornication and Idol Worship as Hyperbole of Protestantism

More specifically, every priest is himself standing in the place of Jesus and is marrying his parish or his diocese.

What we found in the woman at the well is that there are epically five great husbands in the history of the Church: the five highest Bishops in the world, the five Great Patriarchs, the five Great Apostolic Sees. The woman had had five husbands and was now with a fornicator.

Now, astonishingly, Christendom started out with one great husband, Peter; they were all united. When the Great Schism came, the Unfaithful Woman, who can symbolize Christian disunity in her marital digression, or Unorthodox Woman [the Samaritans were unorthodox to the Jews], divorced herself from Peter and took upon herself four husbands, the other four See's of the East. Later, when Protestantism came, the woman effectively divorced herself from all Apostolic succession and started taking on pseudo husbands.

Now, what do we mean by pseudo-husbands? Well, when we finally have Protestantism, the final phase of Christian division, we must note that no Protestant minister is a true man of God; no Protestant Minister really has holy orders. No, they do NOT! Why? Because of the following: Protestantism divorced itself from all Apostolic Succession, and not just Peter, as with the those in schism. And without Apostolic Succession, the community has no legitimate Bishop to ordain other Bishops or priests. Hence, Protestant ceremonies of “ordination” are not valid or fruitful, no matter how holy or good the men in question are, whether the ones ordaining, or the ones being ordained.

But Protestant ministers do do all sorts of things like valid-holy-orders men. They act like true men of God, even in subjective sincerity. They preach to their congregations; they baptize; they marry; they sometimes anoint; they make wafers and grape juice that are like Holy Communion; they lay hands on elders, as they call them.

So they do a lot of things that are like priests, just as fornicating live-in husbands act like real husbands. Many domestic partners today are a man who works for his woman, does the dishes for her, plays with the kids, changes their diapers, has sex with her, has kids with her, and so forth. But she is not really his wife; they're only domestic partners. He's a pseudo husband, and in the end, he is a fornicator.

Hence, after the five husbands divorced, “And the man you are now with is not your husband.”

This means that after all Apostolic succession is left behind, that is, the five Great Apostolic Sees [five husbands?], all that are left is pseudo husbands—fornicators.

This can be the first application to the Book of Revelation where it cites fornication twice in the letters, the 3rd and the 4^th.

Meat Sacrificed to Idols: Worship without the Mass and Eucharist

Let us move on to the next weird thing, unlawful meat and idol worship.

Now, with regard to sacrifice and worship, all true Christians are called to sacrifice a certain meat to God; what is that meat? Note, it is a certain kind of Flesh. That is right; it is the FLESH OF GOD HIMSELF!!! THE EUCHARIST!

THE TRUE MEAT THAT GOD WANTS US TO SACRIFICE IS THE BODY, BLOOD, SOUL, AND DIVINITY OF OUR MAKER AND SAVIOR, JESUS! Crackers and grape juice are NOT what God wants! it is unlawful meat!

And what is the ultimate form of worship within which God desires us to worship Him on earth? The Holy Mass! So then, clearly, Christians that do not do their ultimate Worship in the Mass are not worshiping God in the right way, and if the worship is not right, then it is not what God wants, so that it can be like IDOL worship hyperbolically. Because the Holy Mass is the ultimate, nothing else can compare to any service. Hence, if it were possible when the apocalypse mentions fornication and meat sacrificed to Idols in a historicist context, it would have actively to be talking about Protestantism or Proto-Protestantism.

Now, we are not condemning those persons to Hell. Many of the pastors and followers are good people and can be saved; rather we are saying that, objectively and hyperbolically, we can conceive of these analogies.

Moving on, where, we ask, are these analogies found in the seven letters? Specifically, these expressions of fornication and meat to idols occur in letters three and four.. In terms of ages of the Churches, which ages were letters three and four? Let us review: again, the seven letters were as follows according to the seven phases of the dragon

The first letter: Pagan Rome
The second letter: the Christological in Trinitarian heresies up until the schism
The third letter: the Middle Ages
The fourth letter: Protestantism and Enlightenment until the Modern Age
The fifth letter: the minor apostasy, which is our age
The six-letter: the age of Peace when Christians are reunited and the church is vindicated
The final or seventh letter: the great apostasy

Letter III:

And to the angel of the church of Pergamus write: These things, saith he, that hath the sharp two edged sword: [13] I know where thou dwellest, where the seat of Satan is: and thou holdest fast my name, and hast not denied my faith. Even in those days when Antipas was my faithful witness, who was slain among you, where Satan dwelleth. [14] But I have against thee a few things: because thou hast there them that hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balac to cast a stumblingblock before the children of Israel, to eat, and to commit fornication:

Letter IV:

And to the angel of the church of Thyatira write: These things saith the Son of God, who hath his eyes like to a flame of fire, and his feet like to fine brass. [19] I know thy works, and thy faith, and thy charity, and thy ministry, and thy patience, and thy last works which are more than the former. [20] But I have against thee a few things: because thou sufferest the woman Jezabel, who calleth herself a prophetess, to teach, and to seduce my servants, to commit fornication, and to eat of things sacrificed to idols.

[21] And I gave her a time that she might do penance, and she will not repent of her fornication. [22] Behold, I will cast her into a bed: and they that commit adultery with her shall be in very great tribulation, except they do penance from their deeds. [23] And I will kill her children with death, and all the churches shall know that I am he that searcheth the reins and hearts, and I will give to every one of you according to your works. But to you I say, [24] And to the rest who are at Thyatira: Whosoever have not this doctrine, and who have not known the depths of Satan, as they say, I will not put upon you any other burthen. [25] Yet that, which you have, hold fast till I come.

Bingo. It was precisely in these ages that Proto-Protestantism and Protestantism arose. In the Middle Ages, precursors to Protestantism begin: effectively, non-Apostolic forms of Christianity that call out corruption in the Catholic Church hierarchy: the Waldenses, Wycliffe, Hus. Because such persons rejected the Apostolic Succession, they are not true men of God, and therefore are fornicators spiritually. Their worship is foreign without Apostolic succession; it has no Mass and hence no true sacrifice; it is, therefore, in our forth-proceeding hyperbole, meat and idols.

Protestantism and the North/South Schism

And, of course, the fourth letter is full Protestantism, which is self explanatory!

And while we are here in the fourth letter, we can easily notice that there is a supreme apocalyptic character present in all this: Jezebel! Yes. Now, I have already seen Jezebel as Protestantism in my first rendition of this theology a year ago, but I didn't even realize how profound it is when we go back to the Old Testament's schism. Toward that end, we can quickly go over the developed OT theology I have with regard to the North and the South.

To start, I went to a men’s conference where the beloved Father Bill Casey was. I have great respect for Father Bill’s great sincerity and orthodoxy, so I mean no disrespect here, and even wish to thank him for perhaps unknowingly leading me to refine my “division of the People of God” theology.

Anyway, Father Bill Casey disturbed my theology but then soon it made it deeper. You might remember this.

So here we go. The North and South broke up in the Old Testament. The North is the one that tore away, and they took 10 of the 12 tribes with them. The remnant two tribes in the South were the true Kingdom. In the New Testament, the East and the West broke up. The East was the one that left and took four of the five Apostolic Sees. The 12 apostles fulfill the 12 tribes. Therefore, there is no question that at least at face value, the East fulfills the North and the West, or Catholic Church, fulfills the South, at least in this dimension. Not to mention that after almost a couple hundred years the North was chastised first for godlessness by Assyria. The South had over 100 years to repent to escape her sister's fate but they did not and so they went into Babylon.

L et us fast forward in the New Testament. The great chastisement on the East came first in the form of atheistic materialism, or communism. We, the West, have largely been spared from this horror of Communism and have had 100 years or so to repent, but we have not. Now we are going into a different beast, relativistic hedonistic materialism, and it is persecuting us in the way of religious freedom through situations like gay cakes and abortion contraception in insurance policies Etc

Assyria, Babylon; atheism, relativism; North, South; East Wes

All seems well, but where is Protestantism. Father Bill Casey pointed out then that the North eventually fell into far greater errors than did Eastern Christianity. And that is true and something I had overlooked. In fact, evidently, Dr. Scott Hahn has cited an author from the 60s [is that right?] who saw the North as Protestantism.

Clearly, however, in order that all may be fulfilled, if there is an Old Testament type or anti-type of something, we would expect it to be whole, not leaving out essential components. Toward that end, whereas the North/South is just one split, Christianity has two forms of rift, each with supreme presence in the Divine Plan: schism, and heresy. Hence, we should try to formulate a type from the singular North that can account for both types in the New. What I discovered is, with some research, a very easy and profound way exists. Let us probe it.

We need to look deeper into the history of the schism of the Old Testament. More specifically, there we will see that there are two dimensions in the Northern schism, each with two segments that can give us the two great forms of New separation.

The first dimension that has two segments is geographical. The second dimension is chronological.

Let us take the geographical first because it is self-evident. Remember first that the true place of worship is in the South in Jerusalem, obviously. Well, here is something mind-blowing. As soon as the North split, or thereabouts, it established not one but two places of worship, and, lo and behold, at extreme positions in the North. The first was at Bethel in the very south of the northern kingdom—so close to the North/South border, that it was like less than 12 miles from Jerusalem. The other place of worship was in the far Northern extremities of the North, Dan. Hence, Bethel is very close to the true place of worship, and obviously Dan is very far away, about as far as ways you can get.

Well, lo and behold, just as there are these two locations of worship, there are two primary forms of Christianity separated from the Catholic Church. One is very close to her theologically and grace-wise [schism, or the East] and one is very far away [Protestantism, which is in heresy, is substantially separated from Rome]. Schism and heresy, Orthodoxy and Protestantism. Isn't that unbelievable?

Moving on, the second dimension is chronological. Here, what happens is that when the North breaks up, from what I could gather from my research, there is an initial period of worship that is partly faithful to God, and then finally there is a second phase of worship that is utterly diabolical.

In the first phase that lasted some 60 plus years, idolatry was commingled with Yahweh. There were idolatrous bulls, or calves, at the entrances to their temples but they still tended to have some Yahweh worship. It was corrupted but not on entirely diabolical.

But after some 60 years, King Ahab married a wicked Phoenician pagan woman named Jezebel. Jezebel persuaded him to completely corrupt Jewish worship to make worship of Balaam and Balac. It was total idolatry.

Hence, in a similar vein, the first great division of Christianity was corrupted in a lesser degree, in the sense that some some substantial salvific elements were still retained, as in Apostolic Succession, the Sacraments and Tradition; however, Protestantism was much worse, losing Apostolic Succession and Tradition altogether, and consequently also 5 of the 7 sacraments, retaining only Scripture and a hopeless task of attempting to understand it without the Church. Hence, Jezebel is a perfect theological type of Protestantism and she most perfectly fits in the book Revelation, where she appears in letter IV, which is, wow, the Protestantism and Enlightenment, solo-Ratio. Rock on!

The Fourth Letter and Jezebel

[21] And I gave her a time that she might do penance, and she will not repent of her fornication. [22] Behold, I will cast her into a bed: and they that commit adultery with her shall be in very great tribulation, except they do penance from their deeds.[23] And I will kill her children with death, and all the churches shall know that I am he that searcheth the reins and hearts, and I will give to every one of you according to your works. But to you I say, [24] And to the rest who are at Thyatira: Whosoever have not this doctrine, and who have not known the depths of Satan, as they say, I will not put upon you any other burthen. [25] Yet that, which you have, hold fast till I come.

[26] And he that shall overcome, and keep my works unto the end, I will give him power over the nations. [27] And he shall rule them with a rod of iron, and as the vessel of a potter they shall be broken, [28] As I also have received of my Father: and I will give him the morning star. [29] He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches.

Explication

Now, we come to the mother age, Protestantism and solo-Ratio [Enlightenment, and so forth]. Jezebel is a supreme personage here, and many disturbing things are said. This is entirely apropos. Protestantism and Enlightenment were ages that changed the course of Church history forever. In Protestantism, heresies untold were unleashed like never before, much the parallel expression of this being in the dragon scenes, the dragon’s spewing of the flood after the woman to carry her away. Indeed, the dragon spewed a flood of heresies after the woman in order that the faithful of the Church might be carried away into error.

Protestantism does call itself a prophetess, as if she could teach. She does seduce the servants of Jesus, or Christians, to turn away from the Catholic Church and go with them into heresy, the loss of the Mass. Again, fornication means invalid holy orders, men who seem to be veritable spouses of their communities but are not. And their worship is not the Mass; and their meat is not God’s Body and Blood, and so is meat sacrificed to idols, in metaphorical hyperbole.

It is interesting here, that Jesus gives Jezebel time to repent. What might that mean? BINGO! Trent and the Counter-Reformation. The Catholic Church realized she needed reform in many ways. She cleaned up her act morally, and with Trent, she gave one of the greatest councils in all Church history, answering so masterfully and wonderfully the innumerable heresies and errors of Protestantism.

Protestantism was given the answer she needed. Jesus gave Jezebel space to repent. Did she? NO! She just continued going, sparing minor recaptures. Today, Evangelical Protestantism is as strong as ever. Obviously, those who commit adultery with Protestantism means those who partake of her errors. The punishments they incur will be brought upon themselves, for spiritual, moral error, and deficiencies bring with them their own intrinsic consequences. “And if any man will harm them, in this manner must he be harmed.” Apoc. 11

And I will kill her children with death, and all the churches shall know that I am he that searcheth the reins and hearts, and I will give to every one of you according to your works.

This is clearly one of the most profound statements in all apocalypse, and quite veritably, a difficult passage. “And I will kill her children with death!” These are not the words of the beast or false prophet. These are not the words of scary creatures otherwise. They are not even the words of our Sacred Author, St John. These are the words of Our Lord, Jesus Christ, HIMSELF!!! How could Our Lord say that He will kill CHILDREN, and at that, either PHYSICALLY or SPIRITUALLY! Timeout! Catholics know that Scripture sometimes uses HYPERBOLE, or great exaggeration to get a point across. Jesus obviously would not be in the business of killing, either literally or spiritually, and certainly not children, “for such as these are of the Kingdom of God!” What, then, can be assuaged from this? The answer lies in the reality of God allowing evil to run its course because it has become too hardened to respond to grace.

We see this, for example, with the infamous verse “And God hardened Pharaoh’s heart.” God would never directly cause someone to sin. Yet, God can withhold grace from a sinner because they are already so hardened that they wouldn’t respond anyway. It is in this sense that God “hardened Pharaoh’s heart.” Through the progress of the plagues upon the Egyptian People, Pharaoh became so enraged at God and determined to resist Him, that God had no choice but to withhold further grace from Pharaoh in order that he might allow him to slide into ultimate rigidity, holding out the remote possibility that Pharaoh might repent if things got bad enough for him that he had nowhere to turn.

Returning to our difficult Scripture, then, we must assume that when Jesus says he will kill the children of Jezebel with death, it means that the adverse historical effect that the apocalyptic Jezebel is leaving upon humanity will be so bad, that a subsequent “afterbirth” evil will follow of its own course because of the resistance of grace in the self-same historical sense. More specifically, we can surmise that this afterbirth will veritably be a “spiritual death” of one kind or another.

This is exactly what happened; let us elaborate. The rejection of all supernatural religion and retention of only Reason in the ages of Enlightenment, Masonry, the French Revolution, the Renaissance, and so forth, was clearly the natural reaction to Protestantism. More specifically, Protestantism unleashed a fury storm of self-styled "teachers" tossing innocent heretics to and fro with their hard-hearted and frightening doctrines.

But then, in light of the great apocalyptic division of Christians--the confounding, the hatred, the betrayal, the mass, mutual excommunication—the natural result is loss of faith in Christ. Indeed, as the Christ prayed Eucharistically, "Father, I pray that they may be One as you and I are One, in order that the world may be believe that You sent Me," this clearly implies that if they are "not one", the world will NOT be able to believe. And if the world has not believed, they will reject the SUPERNATURAL dimension of faith and repentance. Hence, the resulting condition is at best merely naturally good. ("And because iniquity will abound, the charity of the many will grow cold!", Matthew 24 [charity is supernatural goodness, or sanctifying grace]). This can be the theological meaning of the assertion in the Second Great Woe, appropriately the Enlightenment and subsequent ages of solo-Ratio, or reason alone, "And by these three plagues was slain the third part of men," That is, the death is not literal but spiritual, a supernatural death, the rejection of all things supernatural: Divine Revelation, or supernatural knowledge, and of all Divine Intervention, or supernatural help.

Hence, “and her children I will kill with death!” The consequences of apocalyptic Christian division lead to supernatural death in the world.

Finally, all the churches shall know that Jesus is a searcher of hearts. This seems to imply that eventually, Christ’s Church will be vindicated by this derailment of Christian history, as if a great multitude of souls will see that Protestantism cannot come from God because of its historical consequences. I think this Is very telling of many young people now, and on the Journey Home, that continue to say that one great reason they came home to Rome was because they were so disillusioned or disturbed with the divisions in Protestantism that they saw there needed to be a central authority. Indeed, I think many Protestants right now don’t take seriously finding the truth but rather just go to an entertaining church that emphasizes emotion and relationship to the detriment of doctrine. As more become desirous of a deeper truth, they may soon find Christianity in all its fullness.

Protestantism Finds a Type in Jezebel

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